FAR Limited and its JV Partners Cairn Energy, ConocoPhillips and Petrosen are to use the Ocean Rig Athena drillship to drill FAR’s prospective Offshore Senegal Blocks which is to start next week.

The drillship which is in Angola is expected to start preparing to move to Senegal in few days.

FAR’s drilling program to be managed by ConocoPhillips, comprises three wells including two appraisals well on the SNE-1 discovery. It also entails a coring and testing program, and an additional one shelf exploration well to assess the shelf area prospectively which is predicted to be completed by mid-2016.

SNE-2 and SNE-3 are to be drilled to appraise the SNE field aimed at proving the economic field size which the company guesses would turn out to be 200 million barrels for a foundation project.

Meanwhile the third well BEL-1 is to be the first exploration well to be drilled following the FAN-1 and SNE-1 discovery. It will be drilled into the Bellatrix Prospect which FAR estimated to contain 168 MMbbls on a gross, unrisked, prospective resource basis (according to ASX release on the 13th of April), with 25 MMbbls net to FAR.

“We look forward to drilling our exciting next phase of Senegal wells with the Ocean Rig Athena.  When this modern drill ship is combined with the experience gained from drilling the FAN-1 and SNE-1 discovery wells and the capabilities of the ConocoPhillips drilling organization, we expect to deliver very efficient Senegal drilling operations. In addition, the joint venture has been able to take advantage of reduced deep water rig rates and has secured the rig for a firm three wells and options for an additional three wells in the event of success.” Cath Norman, FAR's Managing Director, told Energy-pedia

Cairn Energy is the operator of the Senagal JV with 40% interest while FAR Limited has 15%; ConocoPhillips 35% and Petrosen 10%.